Ah yes, another fine example of the problems with modern society which as far as I've determined are summed up by these three major issues…
1) Lost by a corporate committee
2) The shifting of our value system from a juvenile attitudes towards violence to a juvenile attitudes towards sex.
3) The fact that we could apply the Rotten Tomatoes systems towards other industries like Medical Facilities, and we don't. Why wasn't this in ObamaCare? Why can't hospitals have a tomatometer?? WHY???
I experienced a similar dilemma just yesterday during the NBC Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Now I used to avidly watch the CBS Parade of Nations as a kid just because I couldn't stand the goofy singing and dancing, and CBS typically had the Hawaii Thanksgiving festival which featured dozens of hula dancers and fire spinners. Hula dancers have the unique magical ability of being really cute, wiggly and somehow age appropriate for all. This presentation was narrated by Texas native actor John Hillerman whom portrayed the stingy British Mr. Higgins on Magnum P.I. To his credit, he actually knew the origins of each dance and told the audience about them in his elegantly faked British accent. "This native presentation from the Awi' kai' a mai' ii' ee' oo' tribe from the early part of the 16th Century in honor of KIng Lai' ii' koo' eii' oo' aii' and his innovations on…" You get the idea. The guy knew his history, and we all benefitted from it. Afterwards they would cut to the Detroit Thanksgiving Day Parade, which… well… bad form CBS, bad form.
All things must pass and with the cancellation of Magnum P.I. John was replaced by some guy… let's call him Male Blond DoucheBag Exhibit A. When it came time to show the hula dancers he didn't know about the origins of the performance, he simply stated "WOW! LOOK AT THOSE HIPS!" I may have only been 12 at the time, but I knew then, as a society... we were in serious trouble.
Which brings us to the post t.A.T.u. era of 2010 and yesterday's Thanksgiving parade during which Shake and Bake ready-to-go musical performer Keri Hilson stopped to sing a song on her big dumb float. She's hot. I know this because she sang about it over and over again many times. She also sang about how men want to grab and drool at her various body parts but as far as I could tell, this was edited out. (I was only on one cup of coffee at the time so my recollection of the incident is foggy at best.) Meanwhile, on the float were about two dozen grade school girls dress as snowflakes accompanied with about three or four overly enthusiastic older men dressed as either castle towers or blue Dawn dishsoap bottles swaying and waving in that creepy oddball sort of way. The whole presentation was like awkward karaoke, you know… where the performer is not great, not horrible…. but iffy at best… trying way too hard to be good and the audience just sits there shifting uncomfortably in their seats, counting the seconds until the song is over. It was like that on a grand scale.
This incident was only to be topped by Access Hollywood, where the host asked a pile of young hot British actors how they were going to spend Thanksgiving?" Granted this was not as embarrassing as "How was your Fourth of July?" But still… maybe they just assumed they were from Texas.
And to all of my friends in Texas… Happy Boxing Day.
